Holness to All Aboard: Hire black-owned businesses

When Broward County Commissioner Dale Holness looks at the train tracks slicing through downtown Fort Lauderdale, he sees the dividing line between black and white communities, from days gone by.

So Holness said he had a special message for the folks from All Aboard Florida, the passenger rail company that plans to run trains from Miami to Orlando and back, daily, starting in two years.

Holness's message: Share the wealth.

"I told them I hoped they’d find some way to be inclusive and ensure that particularly the black community is benefiting from the contracting opportunities,'' Holness told me last week. "And also from the concession opportunities when they build the stores. They didn’t have a plan for it.''

Holness said that including the black community in wealth-building opportunities would be a good way to help heal the community, "considering the long history of what has occurred over time here in Broward County.